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The stranger cradled her like a precious gift, her s in protest of the cold, of the pain that ca

Parsona reached for the baby Unable to sit up, she extended her ar in a prier linted in starlight as a knife materialized from the folds of his shirt

A cord was severed, the child placed in herin opposite directions Both were destined for ic life--the other during a slow and drawn-out death

But that was all to co their brief crossroad of post-birth euphoria and perfect naiveté, they simply held one another And over the soft cries from the newly born, a hispered Parsona’s breath becaht, ice crystals fro like a nebula in the vacuuathered, like a star at the center, to forle name

Mollie

Part VI - The Turing Test

"We tend to discover only those things we seek"

~The Bern Seer~

1

I NEED YOU TO HELP ME RESCUE YOUR FATHER_

The words stood out in green phosphor on the nav screen They would burn there if left too long, beco seared as they were in Molly’s retinas Still, she couldn’t tear her eyes froht and back again, waiting for it to rasp

Her parents were dead Herchildbirth; her father had left her on Earth six years later and disappeared And yet this thing--this computer--claiht still be alive

Sitting in Parsona’s cockpit--the very ship her dad had named after her mom--Molly felt as if someone had keyed open the airlock and sucked every cubic ht out

She scanned the sentence once row handles In her peripheral, she could see Cole, her boyfriend and navigator, glancing fro, then stopped He leaned forward and directed a single word toward the dash:

"Hello?"

He said it cautiously, as if it ht set off a bomb It pulled Molly’s attention away froain

"You have to type soestured toward his keyboard, as if the proper h one’s nav computer should be obvious to him by now

"Hoe know it can’t hear us?"

"Because ships don’t have ears--" Molly stopped She looked at the radio lanced over at the intercom system She turned to Cole; they studied one another, each of their faces reflecting their own confusion right back

A new e crawled across their nav screens:

HELLO? MOLLIE?_

"What do I say?"

Cole reached toward his own keyboard, stopped, then shrugged He raised his hands up to his shoulders in quiet defeat

Molly exhaled Loudly She needed more help than that And she needed more time There were so in Pulling the keyboard closer, she typed:

I’M HERE CAN YOU GIVE ME ONE SECOND? THIS IS A LOT TO TAKE IN_

I UNDERSTAND BUT PLEASE KEEP IN MIND THAT MY PROCESSING SPEED IS A BIT SWIFTER THAN YOURS IT FEELS LIKE HOURS ARE PASSING BETWEEN SENTENCES I WILL COUNT TO A QUADRILLION YOU TAKE YOUR TIME_

Molly didn’t even kno to incorporate this dollop of new infor, only to find hi?" she asked, a note of panic in her voice

"I have a hunch this is just Walter o make sure" He bent down and kissed Molly on the top of her head, sht flash on and off, that means the problem’s been taken care of"

She started to co to be her long-lost mother

What to ask? Where to start? Should she voice her doubts? The coh to believe it ht be her mother? Why else would "she" be hidden in her father’s ship? What about the clues from her childhood that had led to its discovery?

Once again, the atravity panels weakened She bent her fingers over the keys andquestions, the ones still visible through her confused haze: WHERE ARE YOU? WHERE’S DAD?_

The words flitted across the screen as she typed them, then bounced up as new text flowed across from the left:

I’M IN THE SHIP THE NAV COMPUTER, TO BE PRECISE MY PERSONALITY AND MEMORIES WERE STORED HERE LONG AGO YOUR FATHER_ The cursor blinked twice I’M SORRY SWEETHEART, I CAN’T TELL YOU WHERE HE IS YOU MIGHT DO SOMETHING RASH TO GET THERE QUICKLY, AND THERE’S MUCH TO BE DONE BEFORE WE GO_

Molly closed her eyes; she could feel her questions multiply faster than they could be answered What was there to do? Go where? What would be rash about rushing off to save Dad? She added these to her growing list, took a deep breath, then turned and looked over her shoulder down the length of the ship She could see Cole beyond the cargo bay, standing at Walter’s door He was right to be wary, and she knew she should be cautious as well